Presently, during a financial transaction authentication of a customer's identity may be accomplished by a customer presenting some form of identification (e.g., a driver's license or other government issued identification card) to a customer services representative. The representative then checks the information on the identification (e.g., the name, address, date of birth, photograph) against the financial entity's records. Accordingly, if the information on the identification is consistent with the financial entity's records, the customer's identity is authenticated.
Alternatively, the authentication processes may be accomplished through a phone conversation with the customer service representative. The representative asks the customer a series of questions (e.g., social security number, mother's maiden name, address, etc.) in order to verify the customer's identity. In some instances, the answers to the authentication questions are referred to an analyst that manually verifies the correctness of the answers.
These types of authentication are expensive and inconvenient. In order for the customer's identity to be authenticated, they are required to interact with a customer service representative and/or analyst. The need for such people does not allow for automation of the process. The authenticating entity is also required to employ these people (e.g., a 24-hour call center), which can be cost prohibitive. Furthermore, where many transactions are completed “on-line,” requiring a customer to communicate with a representative is inconvenient and may even prohibit such transactions.
An additional shortcoming of current authentication processes is that questions presented to customers are often multiple choice questions. For example, the authentication process in U.S. Pat. No. 6,263,447 to French, et al. issued Jul. 17, 2001, which is incorporated by reference in its entirety for any purpose. These types of questions present at least two problems. One problem is that a fraudulent actor may be able to guess the correct multiple choice answer. A second problem is the privacy of the information presented in the multiple choice answers. The correct answer in the multiple choice questions inevitably contains personal information about the customer. Thus, the fraudulent actor is able to obtain personal information about a customer by discerning the correct multiple choice answer. Accordingly, the methods and systems of the present invention provide solutions to these and other problems.